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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
initial inspiration
initial inspiration
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whiskey&harmonicas
5 posts
Dec 04, 2011
4:02 AM
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Sitting here in the forum, having my morning cups of joe, and for reasons unknown, I start to reminice the earliest days of growing up. On hot summer evenings my mother would sit on the porch and play Polka music on her accordion. The front yard would soon be standing room only, even the corner bars would see the patrons leave to listen to her play. She is the reason I developed a love for playing music.
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eharp
1596 posts
Dec 04, 2011
5:12 AM
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one year for xmas i bought my father in law an accordion. it was used, not full sized, but worked. he has played the piano for years and had a very good ear for music. i got it cheap and thought if he didnt like it, no big deal.
well, when he opened it up, his whole face lit up! then he started to tear up. weird reaction is what i thought.
i find out his dad had played one. his dad wouldnt let him touch it no matter how bad he begged. so it wasnt until my father in law went to college that he was finally able to learn an instrument, the piano.
well, he got it out and started figuring it out. took him 5 minutes before he was wailing on that thing. not just mary had a little lamb, but classical stuff, too!
at that point i moved up to his favorite son in law!
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FMWoodeye
85 posts
Dec 04, 2011
6:11 AM
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When I was very young, Little Walter lived with us for a couple years. He and Muddy Waters would work on songs in our basement, and I would watch and listen...or was that a dream?
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Honkin On Bobo
853 posts
Dec 04, 2011
6:56 AM
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There was never a single artist or moment for me. I grew up listening to the rock and roll of the sixties from a huge collection of 45's my older sister had: the stones, the beatles, the beach boys, the mamas and the papas, hendrix, the kinks, hermans hermits, martha reeves and the vandellas....you name it, if it was cool she had the 45.
A music class in jr high school by a horrible teacher ruined me from ever thinking I had any talent for playing, but I kept the passion for the music none theless all these years.
More recently, I started reading interviews with my childhood musical heros and a common theme about their inspiration, the blues, keeps popping up. And now it's got a hold on me.
finally a few years ago, after going to see more live music over my life than I can count, I thought screw this I'm trying this one more time.
So here I sit, mid 50s, at the stage most musicians go though before they're even old enough to shave, hopin I can develop enough chops to entertain at a bar somenight for an hour or so...before my time on the planet is up.
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jbone
697 posts
Dec 04, 2011
9:02 AM
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for me, i was maybe luckier than some. my mom's father played harp and sang. he was a emigre from britain about 100 years ago. i think even at the early age when he rode a ship to the usa, he was playing harmonica. at any rate when i was a child he used to play for me and sing as well. it was the one thing that consoled me after my father passed away when i was 4 years old. for some reason i never asked him or my mom if i could get a harmonica and learn from gramps. but the seed was planted.
o used to surf the AM radio dial on sunday nights, back in the early 60's there were still "race radio" stations and shows. these shows played music which catered to black people or so they assumed. r&b, swing, and blues. i would just get free listening to this stuff at age 7,hiding under the covers when i should have been sleeping! all the blues greats of the era were on those shows.
about a decade later after i lost my AM radio, i was given my deceased father's only harp as a legacy and keepsake. which at that time i was about as musical as a brick. but a couple years later i actually began learning a bit about it and jamming a little bit in the bedroom. it took me a very very long time- decades- to begin to get any real chops. there were no teachers close to me back then, and when i moved to a city where there WERE a couple of great harp players, i was too proud to ask for help. it took an extra decade for me to actually get halfway decent.
magic dick, jagger, daltry, and several other more or less rock harp guys got my attention in the 70's, but it was when i found my way to the blues that i really began to make this harp journey.
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lor
46 posts
Dec 04, 2011
6:18 PM
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I love these stories.
Music has a life of its own, in the "spiritual" (whatever that is) realm of reality. It infiltrates your soul-space and gets your attention. It is gentle and depends upon your will and energy. It becomes you and represents you as you express it.
It makes you happy, after all the struggle and uncertainty, when people say okay.
It's as close to magic as can be. Your soul-space.
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